January 27, 2006

One Lump Or Two?

Who is behind Lump? I'm not sure, but they've just put out an album,'Lumpdub', on Contexterrior, which should give you some idea as to what their music is about. Having said that, the album is to the centre of Jay Haze's forays into P-funk mind melt, a more conventional glitchy collection of eleven digidub tracks that still has a hypnotic flow. Sometimes it seems that, in a rush to outstrip the opposition, there's a tendency in contemporary techno towards bookishly clever-clever dispays of oneupmanship, which in so doing, loses sight of the groove. Alex Smoke is one of the few producers who manages to fulfill both the egghead and raw funk quotas with aplomb, but on occasion, others, like Jeff Samuel, sound like they stood on their pet hamster. Anyway, 'Lumpdub' by Lump has a refreshing simplicity and, unlike this post, doesn't ramble too much!